Neither is the California legislature:

California Assembly Bill HR 36 Relative to Pluto's planetary status

__________________
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Stern is getting hysterical. Insulting the other side is not going to win the argument for him.

"The New Horizons project, like a growing number of the public, and many hundreds if now thousands of professional research astronomers and planetary scientists, will not recognize the IAU's planet definition resolution of Aug. 24, 2006."

Whoa! Does Stern speak for NASA on this? "NASA will, of course, use the new guidelines established by the International Astronomical Union," said Dr. Paul Hertz, Chief Scientist for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters. "We will continue pursuing exploration of the most scientifically interesting objects in the solar system, regardless of how they are categorized." (NASA Press Notice)." I don't think NASA wants to get into the position where it is seen as supporting an attempt to undermine the IAU!

Who cares what a state legislature thinks. These are the kind of people who have previously said that lobsters were insects and that insects weren't animals!

Wow, those were his harshest statements to date. Regardless of disagreements about classification and linguistic rigor, some of his comments are way out of line.

This is all about appropriate classification. No one is trying to marginalize Pluto or any other bodies in the system. Stern contradicts himself with this comment:

Yes, exactly! Earth and the other 7 "classical" planets are MISFITS when compared to the vast numbers of dwarf planets that obviously inhabit our solar system.

And, as misfits, it makes no scientific sense whatsoever to lump them into the same classification as Pluto and the other "dwarf planets" or whatever you want to call them.

It's not about the names, it's about the classification. However, something has to be called a 'planet'. Is it going to be Earth and the other 7 big guys, or the hundreds of KB objects?

__________________
"Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph" -- Conan

Pluto is now officially named (134340) Pluto.

(134340) Pluto 1930 01 23 C. W. Tombaugh, Flagstaff
(136199) 2003 UB313 2003 10 21 M. E. Brown, C. A. Trujillo, D. Rabinowitz, Palomar
(136472) 2005 FY9 2005 03 31 M. E. Brown, C. A. Trujillo, D. Rabinowitz, Palomar
(136108) 2003 EL61 2003 03 07 F. J. Aceituno, P. Santos Sanz, J.L. Ortiz, Sierra Nevada

See more

__________________
`Irony` actually does mean `metal like`...

Good for a badly needed giggle.

__________________
The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

EDITORIAL NOTICE
(From MPC 57525)

Read more

__________________
`Irony` actually does mean `metal like`...

And of course, the webcomics have The Mouse weighing in on the subject...


...and so do the troops at ThinkGeek...

__________________
"If a tree is cut down in the rainforest, and is used to make paper to print a book, and the book is really bad, and there's nobody that will read it, do you still hear a sucking sound?"
Charlie in Dayton, A.AsC.

I have no problem with anything the International Astronomical Union (IAU) decides on any matter concerning Astronomy. THAT SEEMS TO BE THEIR JOB. Pluto/Charon have quite a different combined orbit from the traditional eight planets. Astronomy is a SCIENCE and is not something where everybody makes the decisions. The members of the IAU make rational sense in their decision. Get used to it.

ljbrs

__________________
"There is in the universe neither center nor circumference." Giordano Bruno Born 1548. Torched 1600.

Ummm, this is a joke, isn't it?


Please tell me it's a joke and not just normal Californian lawmaking.

Noticed NASA issued a press notice on New Horizons yesterday. It says:

"Poor New Horizons. When it launched in January 2006 it was with all the prestige of the first spacecraft to study Pluto, the last unvisited planet in the solar system. That changed seven months later, when astronomers decided that Pluto was not a planet. For the time being, New Horizons is at least the first mission to a dwarf planet -- the new class of objects into which scientists dumped Pluto. But that doesn't mean it will be the first spacecraft to visit a dwarf planet. Under the new definition (it's still unclear), Ceres may be upgraded from asteroid to dwarf planet, and if NASA's Dawn mission launches as planned next summer, it will arrive at Ceres in February 2015, five months before New Horizons gets to Pluto."

Very diplomatic. Accepting the IAU's definition, but allowing for the possibility of change. (You can possibly detect the writer's opinion in the use of the word 'dumped'! ) Not directly supporting Stern, but not a slap-down either.

Of course, Pluto, Ceres, and the science involved in those missions will remain completely unchanged.

One of the coolest things about the ruling is that Ceres is upgraded to a dwarf planet. I think a lot of people see the asteroid belt as just a massive swarm of house-sized rocks (think of any sci-fi representation of an asteroid belt), so the increased prestige of Ceres may help counter that. It is big, round and looks like a dwarf planet. :P

__________________
"Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph" -- Conan

Not me.

And I don´t regard IAU as a Council of the Wise. They´ve made a pretty good mess, and it´s not only me in my insignificance who says that...

__________________
What brings us together is stronger than what pulls us apart

"Dumped", "demoted", "killed", ...

It's only a reclassification, for goodness' sake! Pluto hasn't gone anywhere or changed a bit.

__________________
Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

But Micky has kicked out his dog, sorry dwarf dog.

__________________
Moderations in purple

Fame, glory, adventure, a cyber warrior craves not these things.

To report a post (even this one) to the moderation team, click the reporting icon in the upper-right corner of the post:
─────────────────────────────────────────────
◄ Rules For Posting To This Board ► ◄ Forum FAQs ► ◄ Conspiracy Theory Advice ► ◄ Alternate Theory Advice ►

It is an "unnessesary" reclassification! I
could have gone with "small planet" but dwarf
seems derogatory. I suspect the reasoning, in
addition to burying good work by Lowell and
Pickering, is to prevent tiresome media
excitement over two new planets. And to prevent
the discoverers coining it

Let's call them size-challenged planets, then.

__________________
Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

The city of Madison, Wisconsin has decided to embrace Pluto and has rejected the IAU definition as intolerant.

__________________
I would rather understand one cause than be King of Persia. -Democritus of Abdera

And who are they to defy the professional astronomers?

__________________
Moderations in purple

Fame, glory, adventure, a cyber warrior craves not these things.

To report a post (even this one) to the moderation team, click the reporting icon in the upper-right corner of the post:
─────────────────────────────────────────────
◄ Rules For Posting To This Board ► ◄ Forum FAQs ► ◄ Conspiracy Theory Advice ► ◄ Alternate Theory Advice ►

Or maybe the astronomers should stick to astronomy

From their illustration, it's hard to tell where the AGU's Planetary Sciences Section's opinion lies.

I Was Wondering When they'd Finally Get Around ta' This ...

Well, I Guess This Now Makes it All OFFICIAL Liike ...

So, Thiink they Shoulda Juust Taken Number 10,000, When it Was Offered?

__________________
If you Ignore YOUR Rights, they Will go away.

Who's they? Pluto and Charon?

Indirectly Yes ...

But DIRECTLY, The General Public ...

The Idea Was Touted Years Ago, Riight After The Discovery of Quoar!

__________________
If you Ignore YOUR Rights, they Will go away.

I remember, but I don't think it was offered directly to the general public.

What I like about the number 134340 is that it is the number of seconds in 37h 19m, both of which are prime--and equal to 2239 minutes which is also prime.

It appears composer Colin Matthews will now have to revise this particular piece:



It's appropriate perhaps that the Matthews music never really fit in with the Holst music. Looks like Gustav got it right the first time.

__________________
A person's name, or a mark representing it, as signed personally or by deputy, as in subscribing a letter or other document.

It's not all bad considering all the orbiting objects revolve around a dwarf star.

Speaking of which, ya'll reckon now would be a bad time for us to announce to the world that the sun is not yellow????

__________________
Lighten up! This is a stellar board!

Ah huh ...

Somethiing Tells me, you Wouldn't Be TRUELY Happy, Unless you Could Relate it to Pi!

__________________
If you Ignore YOUR Rights, they Will go away.

Hey, it starts 134... I thought that was obvious!

*lol*

__________________
And you, to whom adversity has dealt the final blow
With smiling [faces] lyin' to ye' everywhere ye' go
Turn to, and put out all your strength of arm and heart and brain
And like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.

Let's say it's ok for anyone on this forum to pretend they are the "IAU". If that was true for me, this is how the solar system would be, from 2006-?:

(1) sun
(2) terrestrial planets
(3) jovian planets
(4) asteroids, including Ceres
(5) Kuiper belt objects, including Pluto and UB313, Quaor
(6) comets, any objects that grow a tail
(7) cosmic dust, that is, meteoroids

does that about cover it? this way, everything fits into a logical group, based on the history of how these objects formed.

The good thing about each of us being the "IAU" is that we aren't going to be pressured by political interests, peer pressure, etc., like the real IAU is.

The point of this post is that no matter who decides, the objects are what they are, and this is just a silly matter of semantics. Long after humans have departed earth, the solar system will still be here, as it was long before we were here. Pluto will get the last laugh.